History Main / MugglesDoItBetter

** Magical communication seems to be significantly lacking behind the muggle alternatives pretty significantly. The best method they have is sending letters by owl, a system with a number of obvious flaws. Even something as basic as a telephone apparently has no magical peer. In ''[[Literature/HarryPotterAndTheGobletOfFire Goblet of Fire,]]'' Harry mentioned that Muggle surveillance equipment might be useful. Hermione refutes it, but on the grounds that the amount of magic present around Hogwarts prevents anything electrical being used, not that it wouldn't be effective. There are several instances where such technology would have made life a lot easier or [[CouldHaveAvoidedThisPlot solved a plot point altogether.]] If they had any sort of magical-equivalent Google search for the library, half the suspense of Books 1 (Nicholas Flamel), 2 (The Chamber of Secrets), 3 (Sirius Black's bio), and 4 (gillyweed) would definitely be eliminated, as instead the kids were forced to just stumble through on incomplete information. Books 5, 6, and 7 also feature significant issues with communications. Message boards, wikis, or any sort of standardized instant-communication system like cell phones or even two-way radios could have prevented [[spoiler:Sirius' death.]] Although Harry did have a magic two-way mirror, the wizard equivalent of a cell phone (although apparently not common at all, as this the only time it appears in the series), he just [[RememberedICouldFly forgot that he had it]] (a fact which is {{lampshade|Hanging}}d at the very end of the book).

* Alexandra feels that Muggle warships, snipers, and other innovations could beat the Ministry of Magic withiut much effort and is proven at least partially right when the Muggle Prime Minister orders Fudge to turn over [[spoiler:Galahad and Dumbledore]] for war crimes trials. When Fudge refuses in a high-handed manner and threateningly brandishes his wand, the Prime Minister's security detail tranq him and place him under arrest.

* In ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfKorra'', Amon explicitly says that modern technology now allows any non-bender to go toe-to-toe with a bender, thanks to the spiffy taser gloves his men have invented. In practice, though, a bender still has the advantage at range (they haven't moved up to guns).

*** Then there's the reason the National Guard showed up in the first place: The MenInBlack, a.k.a. the Library of Congress Collections Division. Marcone thinks they've identified every entity involved in the Battle of Chicago from the after-action news coverage. Lara thinks it's optimistic to believe they weren't all identified as they rolled into town. Put simply, these are people who scare {{physical god}}s shitless.

* ''TabletopGame/Shadowrun'' features this as a central theme as magic returned around the time society had entered into a cyberpunk dystopia. As a result, many of the earth-shattering feats of magic are easily replicated by technology and in some cases are even done better. Shooting fire from your fingertips is cool, but assault rifles with caseless ammo can be bought at a local gunshop for an affordable price. Making golems and homonculi seem impressive until you realize that this setting has cloning technology and drone warfare. Adepts, the magical martial artists of the setting, can pull off otherwise impossible feats of strength and athleticism, but so can muggles with cybernetics. With that said, Shadowrun is also very good at demonstrating that magic is still capable of performing incredible deeds, from healing wounds on the fly to conjuring up natural disasters capable of leveling cities.

** Zig-zagged in the ''Gehenna'' scenarios that involve [[TheUnmasquedWorld the Masquerade being blown wide open]]; escalation happens when the smarter vampires take action; for example, a Ventrue using [[CompellingVoice Dominate]] to force the launch of nuclear missiles.

* ''ComicBook/WonderWoman [[ComicBook/WonderWoman1987 Vol. 2]]: After giving both Characters/{{Wonder Woman|TheCharacter}} and Hermes a hard time, Ixion is ultimately taken down by the U.S. Air Force, though Wondy and Hermes were trying to capture him rather than kill him.

* One of the ''ComicBook/MarshalLaw'' comics sends superheroes back to World War I. They turn out to be pretty useless to the war effort. The idea that superheroes aren't all that useful in actual combat is in fact a recurring theme of the series.
* Zig-zagged with ''ComicBook/{{Fables}}''. The more powerful magical beings are basically gods that can destroy worlds, but a good chunk of the war between the Fables of Fabletown (living in the real world) and the Adversary (what they ran away from) shows the advantages mass modern technology has over magic...''but'' it's made clear that it stems in part due to a lack of preparation by the Adversary to have counter-defenses.
* {{Subverted|Trope}} in an issue of ''ComicBook/JusticeLeagueOfAmerica'': the son of the recently deceased ComicBook/GreenArrow has to fight a bad guy and his {{mooks}} using an old set of arrows his father left behind. He laments that they're all ridiculous [[TrickArrow trick arrows]], such as a handcuff arrow or a boxing glove arrow, and wishes his dad would have had at least one regular arrow among them. He [[spoiler:ends up defeating the bad guy with a boxing glove arrow]].

* In his first fight against the Masters of Silence, ComicBook/IronMan was confronted with the fact that they were [[KungFuProofMook immune to his repulsor bolts]]. In their second battle, Iron Man wore the so-called War Machine armor, equipped with [[SuperHeroPackingHeat guns]]. [[MoreDakka A lot of guns]]. The Masters of Silence were promptly trashed before being confronted with the fact they had been tricked into attacking Stark in the first place.
* A long-standing question in ''ComicBook/XMen'' is why Sentinels are a threat to mutantkind. Characters/{{Ma|rvelComicsMagneto}}gneto has demonstrated a penchant for using his powers and scientific genius to construct incredible {{Supervillain Lair}}s inside active volcanoes or on asteroids and even uses robots himself from time to time, but never seems to consider countering human Sentinel technology by simply building his own comparable battle robots (though [[ComicBook/UltimateXMen he did once use his powers to make them kill humans instead of mutants]].)
* In Issue 3 of ''[[ComicBook/LokiAgentOfAsgard Loki: Agent of Asgard]]'', the eponymous character is faced with [[SeaMonster giant fish]] Andvari, who is so strong and slippery that "neither hook nor net nor magic could land him". Loki decides to instead [[SchizoTech use a rocket launcher]] and take his gold that way.
-->'''Innkeeper:''' B-but where did you get such a gold-hoard, old one?
-->'''Loki:''' [[BrutalHonesty I shot a fish with a bazooka.]]
* Subverted in the backstory of ''ComicBook/{{Irredeemable}}''. An alien race to attempting to conquer the Earth, and all of the world's superheroes were powerless to stop it. A BadassNormal called the Hornet snuck onto the main ship and got the aliens to leave peacefully. This incident earned the Hornet widespread acclaim, but the truth was that he was just as powerless as everyone else. He only saved Earth by making a DealWithTheDevil.
* Something of a central theme to ''ComicBook/TheBoys''. [[spoiler:The first American superheroes prove useless against the Wehrmacht in the Second World War, the G-Men (X-Men expies) are handily wiped out by Red River personnel armed with machine-guns and flamethrowers. Later, the U.S. military wipes the floor with the superheroes occupying Washington D.C. using copious amounts of airstrikes and heavy weaponry, with only the SupermanSubstitute Homelander proving too tough to crack that way.]]

* The "Final" arc of ''ComicBook/HackSlash'' ends with this, when [[spoiler:Cat Curio manages to whip up an antidote to Akakios's slasher-creating potion in a few days in her own lab]]. Turns out that [[AlchemyIsMagic alchemy]] isn't [[SubvertedTrope magic]] after all and scientific chemistry did make some strides in the last two thousand years.
* One Bronze Age ''ComicBook/DoctorStrange'' story involved an extradimensional warlord magically stealing the U.S. army's equipment. When he steals a nuclear warhead, Dr. Strange gives him a magical vision of the horror such a device can unleash, and he's so aghast that he returns it and all the tanks and such and wants nothing to do with them.
* ''ComicBook/WonderWoman1987'': After giving both Characters/{{Wonder Woman|TheCharacter}} and Hermes a hard time, Ixion is ultimately taken down by the U.S. Air Force, though Wondy and Hermes were trying to capture him rather than kill him.
* Of a sort in ''ComicBook/{{Spawn}}''. The title character's Hell-based powers are capable of incredible things, however, he operates most of his series with a fixed amount of power that, if he uses it up, will send him to Hell. Spawn delays this inevitability by using guns, bombs, and other mundane weapons, which usually are powerful enough to take out Spawn's foes. So magic is better, but muggle weapons won't ultimately send your soul to Hell.
* When ''ComicBook/TheMightyThor'' ex-villain Skurge the Executioner made his LastStand against Hel's army of the dead on Gjallerbru, he fought them with a pair of M-16 assault rifles. The rifles took down scores of the supernatural army before they ran out of ammunition. Even then, Skurge went down swinging one rifle like a club.

* ''Film/ThorRagnarok'' features {{Magitek}} zombies made from Asgardian soldiers, who are able to fight on par with their living counterparts and overrun Asgard's few remaining defenders. However, they're absolutely slaughtered when Skurge whips out a good ol' pair of 5.56mm-spewing assault rifles from "Tex Ass."
* In ''Film/AvengersInfinityWar'', the heroes equipped with conventional weaponry (e.g. [[Characters/CaptainAmericaHeroes The Falcon]]'s submachine guns and mini-missile launchers, [[Characters/IronManHeroes War Machine]]'s minigun and bombs, [[Characters/MarvelComicsBuckyBarnes Bucky Barnes]]' light machine gun) end up racking up far bigger body counts than their comrades equipped with sci-fi blasters and fantastical indestructible melee weapons when fighting the Outriders at the end of the film; [[MadeOfExplodium a few seconds of minigun fire can even cause the alien wheel-tanks and flyers to explode in a fireball.]] Characters/RocketRaccoon even asks to buy Bucky's machine gun from him. Earlier in the film, two superhuman alien commandos with nano-tech blades and plasma guns who had just drubbed a super-powerful psychic and a combat android are forced to retreat when a regular human threatens them with a pair of handguns.

* In the ''WebVideo/DragonBallZAbridged'' "Cell vs." shorts, Cell has to face multiple opponents with various abilities. The only one to completely and absolutely win is [[Manga/FistOfTheNorthStar Kenshiro]], who simply [[CombatPragmatist attacked him with pressure point strikes while he was distracted]] with [[YourHeadAsplode the usual results of Kenshiro's fights]]-''twice''. Not even ''Characters/{{Deadpool|WadeWilson}}'' could match it, as Cell managed to kill him multiple times...

** Even when Earth gets more AppliedPhlebotinum, they tend to use it to improve and enhance what they already have, instead of simply replacing their existing technology. They don't use the super-science energy source to replace nuclear weapons, they use it to make nuclear weapons with a [[EarthShatteringKaboom really, really big bang]]. It's not until the [[BenevolentPrecursors Asgard]] hands them a [[WaveMotionGun plasma cannon]] strong enough to fight the ships of the [[SufficientlyAdvancedAlien Ori]] that they upgrade.

* Zig-zagged with ''Comicbook/{{Fables}}''. The more powerful magical beings are basically gods that can destroy worlds, but a good chunk of the war between the Fables of Fabletown (living in the real world) and the Adversary (what they ran away from) shows the advantages mass modern technology has over magic...''but'' it's made clear that it stems in part due to a lack of preparation by the Adversary to have counter-defenses.

* Often played with in Franchise/TheDCU and the Franchise/MarvelUniverse. Some characters manage to do very well against superpowered adversaries with nothing more than the training and technology you see in the real world, Characters/{{The Punisher|FrankCastle}} being a perfect example. Oftentimes, though, the [[PoliceAreUseless police]], the [[MilitariesAreUseless army]], would-be {{Heroic Bystander}}s, and others are completely ineffective against the villains.

* A long-standing question in ''Comicbook/XMen'' is why Sentinels are a threat to mutantkind. Characters/{{Ma|rvelComicsMagneto}}gneto has demonstrated a penchant for using his powers and scientific genius to construct incredible {{Supervillain Lair}}s inside active volcanoes or on asteroids and even uses robots himself from time to time, but never seems to consider countering human Sentinel technology by simply building his own comparable battle robots (though [[ComicBook/UltimateXMen he did once use his powers to make them kill humans instead of mutants]].)

* Something of a central theme to ''Comicbook/TheBoys''. [[spoiler:The first American superheroes prove useless against the Wehrmacht in the Second World War, the G-Men (X-Men expies) are handily wiped out by Red River personnel armed with machine-guns and flamethrowers. Later, the U.S. military wipes the floor with the superheroes occupying Washington D.C. using copious amounts of airstrikes and heavy weaponry, with only the SupermanSubstitute Homelander proving too tough to crack that way.]]

* One Bronze Age ''Comicbook/DoctorStrange'' story involved an extradimensional warlord magically stealing the U.S. army's equipment. When he steals a nuclear warhead, Dr. Strange gives him a magical vision of the horror such a device can unleash, and he's so aghast that he returns it and all the tanks and such and wants nothing to do with them.

* When ''Comicbook/TheMightyThor'' ex-villain Skurge the Executioner made his LastStand against Hel's army of the dead on Gjallerbru, he fought them with a pair of M-16 assault rifles. The rifles took down scores of the supernatural army before they ran out of ammunition. Even then, Skurge went down swinging one rifle like a club.

[[folder: Folklore]]

** In "[[Recap/BuffyTheVampireSlayerS1E7Angel Angel]]", Darla found herself facing a pissed off Angel and a crossbow-wielding Buffy, and quickly neutralized Angel and nearly killed Buffy by whipping out [[DualWielding two]] [[CoolGuns SIG-Sauer P226s]] and shooting Angel first. The only reason our protagonist survived was that Angel managed to overcome the pain from getting shot twice (as a vampire, he wouldn't die from being shot, but it ''really'' hurt) and staked Darla.

* This is initially ''averted'' in ''Manga/AttackOnTitan'', where humanity is barely capable of holding out against Titans despite possessing early firearms, which for the exception of heavy artillery pieces with exploding shells, are completely useless against Titans, and 3D Gear. The only infantry weapon to be truly effective against Titans is barely able to even the fight and even then unless the soldiers are extremely skilled, killing even a single Titan often means sacrificing several men and women. Only when Eren gains his Titan Shifter powers does the humanity have any real chance to fight back against the Titan threat. [[spoiler:However, in the world outside the Walls and Paradis Island where technology has been improving at a steady pace, the Kingdom of Marley, which has relied almost entirely on Titans to maintain their military supremacy, becomes increasingly threatened by its more technologically-advanced rivals, who have developed industrial-era weapons specifically designed to kill Titans. In the latest chapters, these weapons are shown to even be capable of destroying the almost impervious Armored Titan. The primary motivation for Marley's aggression towards the Eldians is their desire to bolster their forces before their many enemies make enough technological advances to render Titans as a whole obsolete in warfare.]]

** Another example is how the Bender police, Metal benders trained as elite cops, were wiped out in a CurbStompBattle by non-benders piloting [[MadScience Giant Mechs]]. Though that was framed more as CripplingOverspecialization, as the mechs were built with armor that could resist metalbending. Chief Bei Fong and Bolin (using normal earthbending) were shown to be a match for them, at least in smaller numbers.

* Most ''TabletopGame/OldWorldOfDarkness'' supernatural characters have this problem, given that magic and [[MadScientist mad science]] suffers from NoOntologicalInertia, while human technology does not. The {{Masquerade}} and the equivalent dictates are in place partially because the supernaturals learned this.

** In the ''Gehenna'' scenarios that involve [[TheUnmasquedWorld the Masquerade being blown wide open]], it's not uncommon for single squads of human soldiers armed with automatic weapons to take out thousands-year-old elder vampires whose cultural stagnation has kept them from adapting to the times. To wit; they're not so stupid or Luddite that they don't know what a gun ''is,'' it's just that guns didn't exist in a time when they were still young and didn't spend as much time as possible ignoring the world, so they have no idea how to practically handle such a threat in person. Escalation happens when the smarter vampires start taking action; for example, a Ventrue using Dominate to force the launch of nuclear missiles.

* Much like its basis in ''Old World of Darkness'' tabletop, this topic comes up in ''VideoGame/VampireTheMasqueradeBloodlines''; while the Kindred are generally stronger, faster, and individually superior to their mortal cousins, they are notably ''not'' [[CantArgueWithElves superior to humanity as a whole]], since they're not only less in numbers than humanity but also still very vulnerable to being killed by any human who knows what they are doing. It is all but stated that if definitive existence of vampires were to make its way to human media, the Kindred would be in the very real danger of being wiped out by the inevitable response organized by human governments and militaries. Thus, as in the tabletop, the Kindred carefully attend to TheMasquerade so to make sure their existence remains little more than a fairy tail to humanity at best.

** [[spoiler:It's also a PyrrhicVictory since said ending leads to the extinction of humanity in ''VideoGame/Nier'' and ''Videogame/NierAutomata''.]]

** This carries over into ''TabletopGame/VampireTheMasqueradeFifthEdition'': What finally shattered the Masquerade was not some big supernatural event, but diligent signal-intelligence work by the NSA. As good as clan Nosferatu are at computer security, the muggle hackers were just a little better. This led to the re-formation of the Inquisition, backed up by most of the world's tier one special ops forces, which in turn led to the complete destruction of the Sabbat, the near-unravelling of clan Tremere, and a severe weakening of the Camarilla in general. It turns out that while a single clueless muggle with a 9mm is an annoyance, a squad of SAS operators with military grade weaponry, explosives and incendiaries, air support, and (above all) good intel on what they're up against and how to kill it, is a whole different bunny.
* Zigzagged in the ''TabletopGame/NewWorldOfDarkness'' game ''TabletopGame/MageTheAwakening''. It's very much not "Muggles do it better", it's "Muggles ''screw up'' magical solutions". Part of what incenses the Diamond Order about the Lie is the fact that it forces muggles to rely on purely technological solutions when magic could do so much more. A fairly untalented Mage could easily cure AIDS or cancer, feed an entire village single-handedly, fix all sorts of genetic drawbacks, or create rare materials... but for two slight problems. The first? Seeing Supernal magic [[GoMadFromtheRevelation drives muggles insane]]. The second? Observation by a muggle [[AntiMagic destroys magic]]. So, a well-meaning Mage can cast "Cure Cancer" on the LittlestCancerPatient... and all he does is drive them insane and give them maybe a few days more of life before their very soul unravels the spell and forces the cancers to come back. Tremendous power, but so very little opportunity to actually [[ReedRichardsIsUseless affect the world]] around them in any major, meaningful way: [[BlessedWithSuck this is some of the true horrors of being a Mage]].

* ''Literature/HelenAndTroysEpicRoadQuest'': [OurGargoylesRock Gargoyles]] are a product of magic usually created as a form of security, but modern-day surveillance technology has made them obsolete.

* Linkara from ''WebVideo/AtopTheFourthWall'', frequently criticizes this trope with bad ''ComicBook/{{Batman}}'' stories, because the cases where it appears allow this trope by depicting characters WITH powers as outright incompetent to make Batman look better. He also invokes this with his ''Top 15 Things That Are Wrong with ComicBook/IdentityCrisis'' video, where in the fight with Characters/{{Deathstroke}}, he notes that he's standing still for most of it while taking on the majority of the ComicBook/{{Justice League|OfAmerica}}. In his words: "This is the part where you take yourself out of the story and realize that a sniper rifle would be more effective than flashy superpowers, and in a story about superheroes, we really shouldn't be thinking that."

** Played straight in ''Videogame/FinalFantasyX''. The backstory of Spira involves a Magic vs Technology war that the magic side was decidedly losing. Their only hope was to use a magical WMD called Sin that would bomb the world into the medieval age and come back around to keep it that way. The heroes only beat it with a [[LostTechnology non-magical airship]] and WaveMotionGun that [[BlackBox nobody actually knows how to maintain]].

** Played straight in ''Videogame/FinalFantasyX'' however. The heroes never would have beaten Sin without the non-magical airship and WaveMotionGun. The only reason the gun can't be used beyond the initial stage of the fight is that it's LostTechnology that [[BlackBox nobody actually knows how to maintain]].

* Comes up repeatedly in ''Series/TheLibrarians''. When Cassandra tells someone "There's nothing more powerful than magic." Jacob corrects her with "Except knowledge." When the villains steal Excalibur and the crown that controls it, the heroes realize it can't just be to use it as a weapon, because even though a flying sword is more impressive than a regular one, the modern world has far more powerful weapons available.

* One of the major points of the ''VideoGame/{{Starcraft}}'' series is the three races: Protoss (pyschic humanoid aliens with telepathy), Zerg (ever-evolving bug aliens that can be created en masse), and Terrans (humans). Despite the obvious power differential in Terrans against the others, Terran tech is more than a match for the others, and even trounces them narratively on several occasions. Story wise, the Protoss, Zerg, ''and'' Terran end up taking down [[spoiler:Amon, a literal god and embodiment of the Void]].

* ''VideoGame/EarthBound'' has [[BadassNormal Jeff]] [[TeenGenius Andonuts]], who uses home-made bombs and rockets to make up for his lack of [[PsychicPowers PSI]], and the weapons he cobbles together from junk can cause more damage than the PSI his allies wield.